The widespread availability of mobile networks throughout various regions provides a readably available communications network for initiating and processing transactions throughout various rural, undeveloped, and even developed regions. For example, in some regions, there may not be sufficient payment processing infrastructure between consumers, merchants, acquirers, issuers, and payment processing networks to allow for established and traditional payment processing networks to operate. However, such regions typically have some mobile network infrastructure. Accordingly, existing mobile network infrastructure can be better leveraged to process payment and non-payment transactions.
Current implementations of using mobile networks for initiating and processing transactions are limited for a number of reasons. For example, in some solutions, a payment processor may work with mobile network operators to install hardware and/or software in each of a mobile network operator's base stations in order to use the mobile network to facilitate transactions for an established payment processing network. However, installing payment processing-specific network hardware at each base station of a mobile network requires significant infrastructure investment and maintenance. Since a payment processor may not necessary have direct access to the base stations, maintenance and monitoring of the installed hardware can be difficult, which raises reliability concerns. Furthermore, the hardware and/or software may be limited in bandwidth and processing speeds.
In other solutions, a mobile network operator and the payment processing network may coordinate with third party service providers (e.g., a third party IP conversion provider) in order to process transactions received on their mobile networks. Typically, third party service providers convert mobile communication messages to internet protocol messages on behalf of the payment processing networks and submit messages to the payment processing network to process transactions. After processing the transaction, the payment processing network may then return the message through the third party service provider, mobile network operator, issuer, and/or acquirer in order to complete the transaction. However, this process can be expensive, inefficient, slow, and complex as it requires a middle entity to manage and process transactions. These solutions may be also inefficient and costly as the payment processor may not have direct control of the third party equipment, and the data transmission may be limited by the size of the data packets configured to be processed by the communications network.
Therefore, there is a need for a mobile payment system to better leverage existing telecommunications infrastructure in a more efficient, reliable, and integrated manner to overcome the limitations of existing systems.
Further, the development and wide adoption of powerful mobile communications devices by consumers has provided mobile network operators, device manufacturers, and other mobile service providers with a large amount of consumer information that may not be directly available to transaction processors. Payment processing networks and other payment systems developed largely before the emergence and adoption of such powerful mobile communications devices used by consumers. Due to the large investment required to integrate mobile devices into existing payment transaction processing flows, much of the additional information that mobile devices can provide have not been integrated into payment systems and those payment systems that have integrated such information, have not done so at the network communications protocol level.
Therefore, there is a need for an integrated communications network that is capable of integrating existing payment systems with the unique information available from the ubiquitous use of mobile devices by consumers.
Embodiments of the invention address the above problems, and other problems, individually and collectively.